What Links Here

Your Town

Here's everything you need to know about the buildings and structures you can find in your town and on your island.

Player HousesOpening Hours: 24 hoursAs you know, there are four identical player houses in each town. At the outset of the game, you decide which one of the four you buy from the Tanuki, the other three remain empty. When you pay off Tom Nook's loan, you have the option to expand your house. Apart from making your living room larger, you can even add on a second floor and a basement to the building. Tom will once again lend you the money for this. Beyond supplying you with bragging value, a bigger house lets you store more furniture and items and garner points from the Happy Room Academy. For more on upgrading and decorating your house, check the Your House section of this guide.

The other three houses are for other members of your family or friends -- or, if you want, you can create another character yourself.

Tom Nook's StoreOpening Hours: 9:00 AM to 10:00 PM (upgraded stores: 7:00 AM to 11:00 PM)The town's Tanuki operates this lucrative little business in one of the northern portions of your village. You can buy furniture here, as well as flower seeds, seasonal items like candy for Halloween, new wallpaper, flooring, clothes, and different tools. You can also sell turnips (i.e. stock) or create and enter codes for off-line item trading with friends. As you progress through the game, pay back loans and buy plenty of items from Tom; he will upgrade his small shop to a convenience store with extended opening hours, and eventually to a large two-story supermarket with a much larger selection.

Nook's Cranny: The initial shop is rather small.

Nook 'n Go: This small convenience store upgrade occurs once you have bought or sold items with a combined worth of 25,000 Bells or more.

Nookway: Tom turns his store into a small supermarket once 65,000 Bells or more have changed hands.

Nookingtons': Tom's biggest store, a two-story department store with additional employees Tommy and Timmy requires a total of 150,000 Bells in transactions.

Whenever Tom upgrades his store, it will be closed for a day.

In addition to special sales, Tom Nook will also hold a lottery on the last day of every month where you can win all sorts of cool stuff, including the occasional NES game.

Police StationOpening Hours: 24 hoursThe Police Station, run by the two police dogs Copper and Booker, is your hub to get information about special events. Copper, who stands outside the station, will let you know what visitors are expected to come to town in the next week, or what celebrations are planned for the month. If a visitor is in town, Copper will also let you know the exact location. That way, you can save yourself a lot of running around.

Inside the station, a second officer operates a lost-and-found counter. Here, you can score old items that players or animals have lost in the past. Don't let Booker's indecisiveness deter you. Any item in here is up for grabs. Note that if you leave too many items on the ground throughout your town for too long, they will also eventually end up here. That includes fruit. There's also a map here you can consult -- and if you're visiting another player's town, Copper will gladly give you a visitor's map as well.

Post OfficeOpening Hours: 24 hoursThe post office is open day or night -- and sending mail is free. There is a catch, however. With the exception of the museum society, the post office will only send letters to animals within your town. Whenever you have finished writing a letter to someone, you have to take it to the post office in order to have it sent. You can also pay back your loan at the same counter, scan an e-Reader card at the eTM to get special mail, or store letters you want to keep.

There are two different post office clerks who work here. One of them is a bit cranky -- she has to work the night shift, after all.

MuseumOpening Hours: 24 hoursThe museum, located in the lower portions of your town, is pretty much a place to showcase your town's private collections. Headed up by the owl Blathers, the museum is open 24/7 for both display and donations. At the beginning of the game, the museum is completely empty. It is up to the human players to supply the items that are displayed in its four departments:

Aquarium: Any fish, jellyfish and frogs can be displayed here.

Insectarium: Butterflies, beetles, cicadas, crickets, and all sorts of other bugs go here.

Art Museum: Donate paintings to complete this mixed art collection.

Prehistory: Dinosaur skeletons and fossilized dino footsteps and eggs make up this impressive exhibit.

The donator's name will be marked on a plaque for each exhibit.

Wishing WellOpening Hours: 24 hoursThis wishing fountain replaces the Shinto Shrine in the Japanese version of this game. The well serves as an information center for you and as a gathering place for the animals. For example, in the summer months, the animals gather here at 6:00 AM to work out to music. You will also be able to receive up-to-date information about the natural balance of the village. You can find out if you need to plant more trees, cut some down, or get rid of weeds. It's up to you to help nature maintain its balance and create a pleasant place to live for everyone. Finally, you are also able to free yourself from delivery obligations here. If an animal asked you to deliver and item, but has moved away into a town you can no longer reach, drop the undeliverable item here and be "forgiven".

Garbage DumpOpening Hours: 24 hours. Emptied on Monday and Thursday, 6:00 AMIf you put an item on the ground, it stays there. If you dig a hole into the ground and bury an item, it stays there, too. If you chop down a tree and leave the stump, it will stay until you remove it. But there are of course limitations. If you get overzealous with your shovel and don't cover up the holes, they will disappear after a while. So how do you throw something away? Easy: the garbage dump. If you leave items here, they will be taken away every week and you don't have to worry about cluttering up your beautiful forest with stuff you don't want. Sure, you can also sell items, but Tom Nook doesn't seem interested in buying old lottery tickets or rusted cans you have fished out of the river.

But the garbage dump isn't just for you. The animals that live in the forest use it to, so it's also a great place for you to find new items. One animal's garbage is another man's television. It's a good idea to check both the garbage dump and the police station's lost-and-found at least twice a week so that you don't miss anything. The dump is emptied every Monday and Thursday at 6:00 in the morning.

LighthouseOpening Hours: Winter OnlyNope, it's not just for decoration. During the Winter months, the mayor Tortimer will go on a vacation. Look for him at the Wishing Well and he'll ask you to take care of the lighthouse while he's gone. If you manage to perfectly take care of it for one whole week during Tortimer's absence, you'll get a nice present.

Able Sisters - TailorOpening Hours: 9:00 AM to 2:00 AMVisit the Tailor to create your own custom patterns that you can apply to wallpapers, carpets, signs, your door, umbrellas, and of course, clothes. You have to pay Mabel for the use of the design tool if you want to use the GameCube to create patterns -- or you can save some cash by linking your GCN with the GBA and use the tool for free. Either way, you'll end up with custom patterns that will expand the already rich texture set of the game.

But the custom patterns are not just for you! You can also pass your own designs on to the other animals in your town. To do this, go to the tailor's shop and press A while standing in front of one of the clothes or umbrella displays in the store. You can now display your design. After a while, some of the animals in town will start to wear them.

Although you can only hold eight at a time, you can save up to 96 different designs here.

Train StationOpening Hours: 24 hoursThis is where you first arrived in the forest, but it's also the place you go to depart. There are 15 different types of train stations in Animal Crossing, so don't be surprised if yours looks different from your friend's. Before you get your own map, you can also come here to look up addresses and figure out where to go. Finally, the station is where you will find the mysterious dog, Totakeke, who will sing a different song for you every Saturday evening. If you show up between 8:00 PM and 9:00 PM, that is...

There are two ways to get out of your town, via a "travel" Memory Card or directly to a friend's Memory Card.

1. Indirect travel: Your character is saved on a secondary Memory Card that doesn't include AC town data. You can now take your character with you while any remaining players can still play Animal Crossing -- despite your character's absence. You can even use this feature to "lock" your character from other players' access.

2. Direct travel: Plug a second Memory Card with town data into Memory Card slot #2. When you depart from the train station, you will automatically arrive in the second town. However, another player cannot play with the Memory Card in slot #1. If any data is changed, you will be penalized upon your return.

To travel back to your town, simply talk to the monkey again.

In the train, two events can take place. Most of the time, you'll bump into your old friend Rover, who proceeds to make useless small talk. But once in a while, you'll meet Blanca, the faceless cat. Take your time and design Blanca a new face. Your custom cat will at a later point in time wander about the village you just visited, so have fun designing something that either freaks your buddy out or makes them laugh.

Temporary Buildings

Katrina's TentKatrina, the fortune teller will visit your town from time to time. Ask Copper and he will tell you her exact arrival date when applicable. Katrina arrives at 9:00 PM and will stay till the next day (she will leave at 9:00 PM).

Visit her tent and you have the chance to pay her 50 Bells to have your fortune read. There are six possible outcomes:

Nothing: She will tell you that something good may happen or something bad may happen. You can have her read your fortune again when you get this outcome.

Bad Karma: The animals in the town will not like you for the whole day. When you talk to them, they will look for excuses and not give you chores or things to do.

Good Karma: The animals will like you more than usual. Especially animals of the opposite sex will be quite taken with you. Exploit this to get gifts and find things to do.

Lucky with Money: This is the one you want to get! Instead of 100 Bell bags, you'll find 1,000 in bags. When you get this fortune, shake all trees and dig everywhere (Golden Shovel) to get rich quick.

Luck with Items: Instead of regular items, you'll have a great chance at acquiring rare ones. Run errands and talk to all of the animals.

Clumsiness: This one's annoying. If you get this fortune, you'll fall on your nose all the time.

Redd's TentRedd is a sleazy traveling salesman who will have the odd rare item for sale. Watch out, though. Some of his stuff is just regular old furniture you'll be able to find for cheap at Tom Nook's. Redd will occasionally sell NES games as well, so if you want to play Balloon Fight, Pinball, Golf, or Clu Clu Land and you've got 12,000 Bells to spare, this is the place to go.

Summer CampersIf you see this tent and feel compelled to go inside, be sure to first drop any valuable items and large amounts of cash you're carrying outside the door. The tent is home to summer campers who like to tell stories, have you guess things, or challenge you to little games. Some of the stories' outcomes are random and you'll end up losing items, so your best strategy is to bring things you don't mind losing. You can win some pretty cool stuff here, so don't ignore the tent. Also, the tents have a winter counterpart: igloos. During snowy months, villagers in your town will build igloos, and play games with you in them.